Behemoths to the fore in Frankfurt as sales window threatens to shut

The Frankfurt show, one of the three biggest in Europe, swaps the fall spot with Paris every year. The third show, in Geneva, Switzerland, is held every spring.

This time at the biennial Frankfurt show, expect to see more battery powered cars, led by the Japanese-French Nissan-Renault alliance. But many experts see this as a bit of a dead end, too, because despite some colorful claims by the likes of Renault-Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn about emission-free power, batteries are not much of an improvement over petrol or diesel power if you examine the whole process of generating the electricity and getting it to the car's battery. Battery price, performance and reliability also leave a lot to be desired.

Motoring excess

The fact that government pressure will shortly be mounting to curb motoring excess seems to have convinced car manufacturers that they had better get their most extreme luxury behemoths off the drawing boards and into the showrooms before it is too late. When the show opens you will see the new Porsche Panamera, Bentley Mulsanne, Rolls Royce Ghost, Aston Martin Rapide, Jaguar XJ, Ferrari 458 Italia, and assorted upmarket and souped up BMW and Mercedes sedans.

But underlining the fragile nature of the European car business, still reeling from the sharp recession although comforted a bit by a plethora of cash for clunkers schemes, perhaps the most important real-world car on show will be the Opel-Vauxhall Astra small family sedan. In normal times, the Astra would have been expected to challenge Europe's biggest seller, the Volkswagen Golf, but the future of GM's financially crippled Opel-Vauxhall still hangs in the balance, after months of negotiations. Previous Astras in various forms notched up about half a million sales a year, or more than a third of Opel/Vauxhall's volume.

Kia of Korea, which with its compatriot Hyundai has been benefitting hugely from European clunker rebates, will unveil the little Venga city car, and a new Sorrento SUV. Ford Europe will introduce the new C-Max minivan, which will also be on sale in the U.S. Audi launches its A5 Sportback, which won't appear in America. Saab of Sweden, dumped by GM, finally has a new model, the 9-5. BMW takes the wraps of its compact SUV, the X1.

Among the concepts, BMW will show a plug-in diesel electric hybrid sports car. (Plug-in hybrids can be charged overnight from your house's electricity supply, and carry small internal combustion engines to top up the batteries on the road). Toyota is expected to announce its answer to the Chevy Volt -- the Prius plug-in hybrid. Renault will have a whole stand full of various battery-powered cars. BMW will unveil the Mini Coupe, already a shoe-in for the prize of the show's ugliest car. Mercedes also will display a plug-in hybrid. VW, Europe's biggest car company and anxious to make a splash at its home show, will test the market with an electric car, and a so-called "One liter" car, which can go for 100 kilometers on one litre of gasoline; that's about 238 miles per U.S. gallon.

Last hurrah

But all eyes will be on the last hurrah of the big beasts, which to give credit to the manufacturers, were probably conceived in more favorable times.

"This will be the last tranche of gas guzzlers; the work has been done -- so (manufacturers will) launch and recoup some of the investment," said Peter Cooke, professor of Automotive Management at Britain's University of Buckingham.

Cooke still believes there is a future for luxury cars, although they will have to make big improvements in fuel efficiency.

John Wormald, analyst with British automotive consultancy Autopolis, agrees that manufacturers had no choice but to continue with their plans to introduce their premium models, and believes the market will revive, temporarily.

"The fun comes in five to 10 years, when we will see very serious concerns about global warming. Once the world economy recovers, we will see oil prices roaring up. That wouldn't be a problem for the person who can afford say an Aston Martin or a Rolls Royce, but governments will say we can't afford more oil imports," Wormald said.

"The question is, what happens beyond that. We'll see carbon taxes, as governments try to cut carbon dioxide by up to 80 percent. There'll be pressure to downsize, to make people drive slower and less, with more restrictions like tolls to get into city centres," Wormald said.

Luxury future

Professor Ferdinand Dudenhoeffer of the Center for Automotive Research at Germany's University of Duisberg-Essen is confident luxury cars will be with us for a while yet, not least because they will ironically lead the route to green technology.

"I'm convinced that we will see super luxury cars 100 years from now. There is a small group of customers who can afford and who like it. Look at the big yachts and helicopters. For climate and greenhouse effects 50,000 cars of this category per year have really no effect. And these cars will integrate new technology like e-mobility and hybrids so that the effects will be balanced in some sense," Dudenhoeffer said.

Before the recession, the global market for luxury cars was between about 80,000 and 90,000 a year. This has since slipped to about 60,000, according to automotive consultancy CSM Worldwide.

Dudenhoeffer is less convinced battery cars will be welcomed in the marketplace.

"At the moment price is uncompetitive -- more than 12,000 euros ($17,500) just for batteries for a compact car to run 150 kilometers (93 miles) and usability is restricted by loading times and the network," he said.

Dudenhoeffer also points to upcoming problems for the German industry, which has done exceptionally well developing diesel engines. New regulations from the European Union -- so-called Euro 6 due in 2014 -- will make diesel uncompetitive and spell danger for the component manufacturer Bosch in particular and German manufacturers in general.

Manufacturers' plans for battery-powered cars don't impress Autopolis's Wormald much either.

Not yet ready for prime time

"This is pure vehicle manufacturer fantasy and product push," he said.

"If you take electricity generated from the average European power station, electric power is at least as bad (in terms of CO2 emissions) as diesel or petrol," he said.

This might not be the case in France, which has more than 80 percent of its electricity generated by nuclear power, and much hydro and some renewable capacity. But the rest of Europe relies on coal, oil and natural gas. Some experts say about two thirds of electric power will be lost between the generating station and the car battery.

"When you add up the well to wheel cost it's no better and in some ways worse; and who is going to pay twice as much for a car with worse performance. There's really no market for this," Wormald said.

Electricity generation

Buckingham University's Cooke also points to big problems if battery power caught on, from the pressure on the generation of electricity to the inefficiency of delivery.

"The big problem will be from electricity generation. Britain faces a huge shortage and other European countries have problems too. Electricity, unless nuclear, can create a huge amount of CO2, and pushing it down wires is not very efficient," Cooke said.

There is one car expected to be on display at the show which might cause buyers to ignore all the disadvantages and go for battery power; that's the little Electric Trabant. A German company, Herpa Miniaturmodelle, wants to reintroduce the old East German car with a battery. The new Trabant won't be made of plastic mixed with paper or cotton fiber like the old clunky original communist icon, but if it is half as cute and adorable as its first pictures, this will be a big success, if its backers can raise the finance.

The show opens to the public Sept. 19-27.

Neil Winton, European columnist for Autos Insider, is based in Sussex, England. E-mail him at neil.winton@btinternet.com.